Poetry Friday: Waterfalls

Whatcom Falls in Bellingham

I've been on hiatus here at The Drift Record while my husband and I sold our home (of thirty years!) in Seattle this spring and moved to Bellingham in June. "Protracted chaos" is the term I've come up with to describe the process.

But we are settling in to our new home now, to the point we're free to take walks to explore our surroundings outside the four walls of the new house. Best so far has been our trek to Whatcom Falls Park, about a mile south along a gravel path through the Alabama Hill neighborhood. The park is deep green, filled with shady, cool air. So refreshing and gorgeous. Isn't the smell of dirt and fir trees in the shade on a hot summer day just glorious?

It's terrifying, though, to see kids jumping off the cliffs into the deep water below the falls.

They throw themselves in, sometimes somersaulting towards the water, way too close to the edges of the rock cliffs - the phrase "reckless abandon" comes to mind. Take a look at these three photos - yikes! 

Did I ever feel that invulnerable? I think I did, but it's hard to conjure up. My 68th birthday was last Saturday, and my body is anything but invulnerable at this point. Vulnerability, of course, is not all bad - the emotional variety being a tad more mysterious and interesting (or less intimidating?) than the physical.

For Poetry Friday, I'll share the opening of the poem "Niagara" by Carl Sandburg about a much, much, MUCH bigger waterfall. Don't you love the word "chutter"?

The tumblers of the rapids go white, go green,
go changing over the gray, the brown, the rocks.
The fight of the water, the stones,
the fight makes a foam laughter
before the last look over the long slide
down the spread of a sheen in the straight fall.
     Then the growl, the chutter,
     down under the boom and the muffle,
     the hoo hoi deep,
     the hoo hoi down,
                         this is Niagara.

Wishing you all a positively hoo hoi week. I'm glad to be rejoining the Poetry Friday community.
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You'll find the Poetry Friday round-up this week over at Tabatha's The Opposite of Indifference.

Poetry Friday: All Moon-mad, Again

Lots of family obligations lately, which means not much writing time. But even when life is busy, there is time to go out and gaze at the moon -- especially when it's a "super moon." How beautiful was that last one? Answer: VERY BEAUTIFUL.

In honor of my seasonal moon madness,  I offer up this poem by Carl Sandburg. It doesn't have the formal inventiveness I usually like -- but I love the boy with the accordion, I love the old man and the cherry trees, and most of  all I love the fact that it is, at heart, all summer and all moon.

Happy Poetry Friday! Only a few more weeks of summer left - make the most of them.

Back Yard 

Shine on, O moon of summer. 

Shine to the leaves of grass, catalpa and oak,  
All silver under your rain to-night.  

An Italian boy is sending songs to you to-night from an accordion.  

A Polish boy is out with his best girl; they marry next month;
    to-night they are throwing you kisses.

 

An old man next door is dreaming over a sheen that sits in a

     cherry tree in his back yard. 
 

The clocks say I must go—I stay here sitting on the back porch drinking

     white thoughts you rain down. 

     
     Shine on, O moon, 

Shake out more and more silver changes.

                                                  --Carl Sandburg 

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Today's Poetry Friday round-up is being hosted by Irene Latham over at Live Your Poem. Head over there to see what other people have posted.